I'm trying to pick out a new video card, but I can't get one that would need a new PSU, as I can't really afford that atm. Right now I have a X850 PRO running on a 400 Watt Ultra PSU. It has 20A current on the 12V rail.

The 8600GTS gives you 1/3 the performance of an 8800GT, and the 8600GT will give you even less.

Also keep in mind the wattage the cards consume when loaded:

Afaik the 3850 consumes slightly more than the 8800GT which consumes 198W. Then the 8800GS (which gives twice the performance of the 8600GT) uses up 172W on load.

Check out that site where you can calculate your PSU requirements for your hardware (I don't know the url offhand sorry but you'll easily find it on this site or using google) because it makes a difference as to whether you have just one HDD and ODD or whether you have 4 HDD and 4 ODD and plenty other stuff.

Do check it out for yourself but I read somewhere that 20amp on the 12V rail should be enough for an 8800GT (and more than enough for a GS) depending on how much more hardware you got sucking power from your psu. I also do remember reading that for the GT you need a minimum PSU total output of 440W and you have 400W so check on that, but maybe 400W is OK for the GS.

If you conclude that you have enough power try to choose the 8800GTS, second best the 8800GT, third best the 8800GS. Jmho but the 8600 series drops waaay too much in performance that it'd be more convenient for you to upgrade the PSU and get a better card.

Should I look at buying a used 7900 GT or something of that nature for $80-ish? Would I get more out of that than the 8600 GTS?

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the 7900/X1900 cards are faster than the 8800GTS but they use alot of power and the 3850 costs too much since your on a 90 dollar budget, I would say get the MSI 8600GT Twin Turbo and overclock it to the 8600GTS clocks

the 7900/X1900 cards are faster than the 8800GTS but they use alot of power and the 3850 costs too much since your on a 90 dollar budget, I would say get the MSI 8600GT Twin Turbo and overclock it to the 8600GTS clocks

Should I go with the MSI or eVGA 8600GT? The eVGA has been shown to be verrrrrry overclockable with voltmods. Would power consumption still be low enough for my 400watt Ultra PSU with voltmods on the eVGA 8600GT?

I'm sorry I missed out your budget when giving my recommendations. For a max of $90 you might be getting this 8600GT 512MB. However there's a lacuna on that card - try to google out the benchmarks, it probably is too weak to be able to fully use up the 512MB of vram it is given.

My advice would be to wait 30 days or maybe slightly more. When the 9XXX nvidia series are officially out the 8XXX series will be further dropping in price and hence become more affordable. And your proc will be getting far better performance with anything better than 86XX...

It'd be a pity to bottleneck your proc with an 86XX or even 96XX series.

Or maybe browse ebay or some place to find perhaps someone who's ready to 'upgrade' and sell his nearly new 88xx series for less $$.

Personally I'm in that position... hopefully my dad will buy new components for me to assemble for daughter's pc.... and then (it'll be a couple of months ) I'll be putting my 8800GT in daughter's pc and getting a 98xx series vid card myself. (Apart from probably also switching cpu's... I'll coax him to get something so obviously better than an E4300!!! shhhhhh!)

After a long hard thinking thread that I made myself, if you need something for the $90 price range, go 8600GT if you cannot find an HD2600XT with DDR4, BUT if you can find an 8600GTS for same price do it.